[Rpm-maint] [PATCH] rpmbuild: clean up buildroot handling, set a default buildroot

[Tom 'spot' Callaway]

On Thu, 2007-02-15 at 15:30 -0500, Jason Corley wrote:
> Nobody seems to care about "BuildRoot: /lib" and that is just as
> efficient at hosing your system as "BuildRoot: /".  If your goal is to
> fix a greater problem, then I submit that the patches JBJ has had in
> his RPM for close to six months are much more a) well tested, and b)
> more effective as a long term solution.  But just in case you forgot
> the (only?) arguments against that idea:
> 
>     1) changes the ABI (not that anyone uses librpmbuild, but....)
>     2) introduces a new macro namespace
> 
> Either you want to fix the larger problem or you want to solve your
> problems.  Either it is unacceptable to change past behavior or it
> isn't.  Either it is ok to make changes that break other's builds or
> it isn't.  You decide it's your community, but right now what I see is
> "we're fine making you change, but don't make us change."

People setting idiot buildroots should be publicly beaten with a trout.
RPM setting an idiot buildroot by default should be fixed.

The proposal here (at least from me) is that we change the behavior of
RPM such that it sets a default buildroot, which can then be trumped by
a system macro, which in turn can be trumped by a local spec define.

This changes the ABI. It doesn't affect the macro namespace.

To the best of my knowledge, Red Hat/Fedora isn't setting idiot
buildroots, nor are we scraping binary bits into rpms. However, even if
we were doing that, I'd still be in favor of fixing this bug.

So, to summarize:

I think its ok to change past behavior.
I think its ok to make well thought out, intelligently discussed changes
that fix bugs.
If these changes break other people's builds, then we need to identify
better ways to make these changes, and/or identify workarounds that
enable their builds to continue functioning.
I don't see any indication of Red Hat ducking changes in favor of
forcing others to change.

~spot